Waste Disposal on Noah’s Ark — Solved!

The last time we addressed this issue was Waste Disposal on Noah’s Ark. In that memorable post, we compared the task facing Noah with one of the legendary twelve labours of Hercules — cleaning out the Augean stables, which had not been cleaned in over 30 years, and over 1,000 cattle lived there. Hercules had to divert two rivers to clean out the stables. With rigorous mathematical analysis, we concluded that mucking out the Ark was only half as burdensome as the job assigned to Hercules, but it was still an impossible task.

Today, dear reader, you’re in for a treat. After years of solitary study, your Curmudgeon proudly announces that he has solved the Ark’s waste disposal problem! Yes, we’ve done it. Through the centuries, the greatest theological minds in the world have struggled with this, but your humble Curmudgeon has found the solution.

Well, what is it? As the image above this post suggests, the answer is Archimedes’ screw. Wikipedia provides a description:

Archimedes’ screw consists of a screw (a helical surface surrounding a central cylindrical shaft) inside a hollow pipe. The screw is turned usually by a windmill or by manual labour. As the shaft turns, the bottom end scoops up a volume of water. This water will slide up in the spiral tube, until it finally pours out from the top of the tube and feeds the irrigation systems. The screw was used mostly for draining water out of mines or other areas of low lying water.

The intellectual breakthrough came to us in a blinding flash of inspiration. If Archimedes’ screw works with water, it should also work with fresh animal waste. Assuming the device was installed when the Ark was built, all Noah had to do was turn the handle, and the muck would be lifted from the bowels of the Ark to the top deck, and then automatically dumped over the side. Nothing to it! It was so simple, Noah probably assigned the task to his wife.

Yes, we know — you’re thinking that Archimedes lived in the 3rd century BC — long after the Flood. That’s true, but as the Wikipedia article informs us, Archimedes probably didn’t invent the device which bears his name. It was known to earlier cultures.

So there you are. The problem of poop removal from the Ark has baffled creation scientists for centuries, but your Curmudgeon has figured it out. We have solved one of the world’s greatest mysteries, and you’re reading about it here, on our humble blog. Verily, this is a day to remember.

37 responses to “Waste Disposal on Noah’s Ark — Solved!”

Doubtless, this wonderful innovation by Noah gave rise to the expression, “He really screwed the poop.”

But I’m still concerned about what the Noahs did when this device got clogged up–as it must have done pretty regularly, particularly after addressing the dinosaur pens. Did they also have a bronze-age version of a Roto-Rooter machine to hand? Enquiring minds want to know…

Through his mastery of historical science, Ken Ham has proven beyond all doubt, even though he, er, wasn’t actually there, that dinosaurs were vegetarians before the Flood. Since that has been scientifically established, what reason have we to believe that, until said point, animals actually pooped at all? Is it not likely that the reason the Noah family had such an easy time of it at the sluice buckets was that excretion had yet to be invented?

I’m expecting a six-figure contract from HarperCollins any day now for my book expanding this theory. Eat yer hearts out, curmudgeonites. Glory will be mine.

Many “creation scientists” claim that because of longer lifespans before the flood as well as superior brainpower, Noah and family were all natural geniuses. So they would have installed generators to the animal powered screw, harvesting all that excess energy so that….well…the energy from the generators would continue to power the screw pump. Therefore, once they got it started, the animal power could be diverted to other tasks—like the deck rotation system, a giant rotisserie-like mechanism which allowed the top level of animals to enjoy 8 hours of sunlight while the other two decks hibernated. So the shift changed every 8 hours when another deck “saw the light of day.” (Or perhaps the nocturnal animals didn’t need light at all and simply went “dormant” and were unconscious for the entire time on the ark.)

Of course, before pumping all of that energy-packed manure, Noah Power & Light would have made biodiesel which they could use to power the electrolytic water purification and oxygen-generation system to supplement the electrically powered ventilation fans. (All of the leftover oxygen was used to disinfect the pens and supplement the air-supply for the scuba gear which allowed the oversized animals which couldn’t fit on the ark to swim alongside. As you can imagine, the BEHEMOTH and other sauropods were hogging more than their share of ark space. That is why they got relegated to the scuba gear and swimming alongside. And that, my friends, explains why the dinosaurs went extinct. Yes, not all of Noah’s inventions worked out all that well.)

Keep in mind that I’m assuming a “creation science” version of Noah’s Flood. If I had assumed the Noah’s Flood text of the Book of Genesis instead, it wouldn’t have included a GLOBAL flood involving every possible animal “kind” on the planet of the baraminologist type. It also wouldn’t have involved every hominid creature or even necessarily every Homo sapien but only the Imago Dei descendants of a particular creature: The Red-soil Human, HADAM from came from the HADAMAH (the red ground). (We are told later on that all creatures come from the ingredients in soil and that is why all animals–including the lineage of Adam–return to the soil when they die.)

Indeed, if Young Earth Creationists abandoned their favorite traditions and the sayings of Chairman Ham, and simply stuck to the Genesis text in what it actually says, they would have a lot less stuff to explain.

Yet, you’ve gotta admit that Ham-style “creation science” can be a lot more fun. You just have to have a sense of imagination.

Yet another pre-flood versus post-flood change. Brilliant! That could also explain why human lifespans dropped drastically after the flood.

Realthog has also managed to explain the origin of the traditional expression which observes that “excretion happens.”

That also happens to be a rough translation of the ancient expression “Ararat”. You see, when the ark first landed there, Noah saw only one solitary mountain. By the end of the first day off the ark, there were many.

And that explains yet another very old saying: “When ya gotta go, ya gotta go!”

Origen (c. 185- c. 254) the early Christian scholar of the Bible, had this to say about this subject:

Certainly since Scripture related nothing about the places which we said were set apart for the excrement of the animals, but tradition preserves some things, it will appear opportune that silence has been maintained on this about which reason may sufficiently teach of its importance. And because it could less worthily be fitted to a spiritual meaning, rightly, therefore, Scripture, which rather fits its narratives to allegorical meanings, was silent about this

Genesis Homily 2; trans. Ronald E. Heine, p. 75.

In other words, this is an allegory, and it would ruin the story to discuss such matters.

My further researches on this topic have yielded additional support for our Curmudgeon’s breakthrough discovery:

Clearly, the top end of Noah’s waste-extracting Archimedes Screw would have been mounted on the upper part of the aft of the Ark, which at once explains (what had previously been another long-standing but unsolved mystery) why that particular structure in naval architecture is known as the poop deck.

Having moved more than my share of animal manure in my younger years I can assure you that your methodology will not work. You haven’t addressed the issues of manure consistency going through the sluice and the materials to be used for the actual screw that could withstand such a daily deluge of manure. If you can’t take your work seriously then I suggest you leave the real science of moving crap to Ken Ham and his crew,

@TomS wants to be recalcitrant by quoting a proto-church father: “it will appear opportune that silence has been maintained”.
Who says creation science doesn’t make progress? Morover Origenes was a catholic.

@EJT tries to be smart: “the issues of manure consistency”
Thinned by piss, of course.

Erik John Bertel says: “If you can’t take your work seriously then I suggest you leave the real science of moving crap to Ken Ham and his crew”

Okay, let’s see how long it takes before creationist websites start using Archimedes’ screw as the solution to this problem. A Google search on “Noah’s Ark” “Archimedes screw” waste shows that as of now, I alone have proposed this as the answer.

As the YEC’ers have convincingly demonstrated that the speed of light was far slower in Biblical Times; it is equally likely that manure on the Noachic Ark was of far, far lower viscosity than the excrement of our own benighted times.

But realthog’s challenge is in fact a blasphemous outrage! While it is true that no creature needed to poop in the Prelapsarian Eden, once Eve had served up that laxative apple, the Curse of Excrement was placed upon man and beast alike forever after….

I must also note here that Erik John Bertel’s objection also teeters on blasphemy when he suggests there is an “issue” about “the materials to be used for the actual screw that could withstand such a daily deluge of manure.”

The infallible Bible assures us, at Gen 6:14, that the material used in constructing the Ark–and presumably all of its fixtures and appurtenances–was nothing less than gopher wood. True, no one living today actually knows what this was (as all gopher trees were destroyed in the Flood), but it must assuredly have been able to withstand any amount of excrement.

No one should doubt this Biblically-based evidence, of course. Faith tells us what the properties of gopher wood must have been even though we don’t have a clue what it was.

But we shall not always be ignorant, As the admirable website Christian Answers.net explains in its article What is “Gopher Wood”?:

The bottom-line is that this ancient word remains a mystery. It is just one of many things I look forward to asking Noah about, when I get to Heaven.

Oh dear! I fear that realthog is rocketing toward Eternal Damnation at a prodigious speed!

The “were you there?” objection can never be applied to Biblical proofs, which trump all other proofs. And the reason is simple: no, neither I nor anyone living today was there to witness Biblical events–but God was there and dictated to Moses his first-person witness statement (and, as God is a Trinity, this simultaneously served as second-person and third-person witnesses statements as well, but that is by the by). To doubt the literal word of the Bible is to doubt the WORD OF GOD HIM/HER/IT/THEM SELF(VES)!

You might as well purchase your one-way ticket to the Fiery Lake of Eternal Perdition now…

But I don’t remember anything at all in Genesis about the advent of excretion. Shouldn’t there be at least some mention of Adam and Eve being enthralled by their new capability? No, I think the onus is on you to prove this one. Until then, I’m standing by my theory.

Megalonyx speaks of “the Curse of Excrement,” but he conspicuously fails to cite any scriptural authority. He’s assuming that his own difficulties in that regard — abundantly attested to by his neighbors who must endure his daily howls of agony — are common to all of us. But like so many of his, ah, shortcomings, his daily ordeal is due to his woefully unevolved condition.

Megalonyx speaks of “the Curse of Excrement,” but he conspicuously fails to cite any scriptural authority.

You want Scriptural spam!? Well, ok—but be warned, the Bible is absolutely swimming in excfement. Here’s just a little ‘taster’:

And thou shalt have a paddle upon thy weapon; and it shall be, when thou wilt ease thyself abroad, thou shalt dig therewith, and shalt turn back and cover that which cometh from thee

Deuteronomy 23:13

And they brake down the image of Baal, and brake down the house of Baal, and made it a draught house unto this day.

2 Kings 10:27

And the haft also went in after the blade; and the fat closed upon the blade, so that he could not draw the dagger out of his belly; and the dirt came out

Judges 3:22

Do not ye yet understand, that whatsoever entereth in at the mouth goeth into the belly, and is cast out into the draught

Matthew 15:17

Therefore, behold, I will bring evil upon the house of Jeroboam, and will cut off from Jeroboam him that pisseth against the wall, and him that is shut up and left in Israel, and will take away the remnant of the house of Jeroboam, as a man taketh away dung, till it be all gone.

Megalonyx, that’s an impressive selection of passages, which I assume you long ago committed to memory. However, nowhere in Genesis does it say: “Eve, because you have disobeyed me, you and your offspring shall henceforth [description of the Curse of Excrement].”

There was no death until the Fall. Adam and Eve were immortal until they ate the blinking apple. They could have thrown themselves off cliffs, cut their wrists, held their heads underwater for a week, and still come up alive and smiling.

And of course, they had no need to eat. In fact, they would have been unable to eat–because you have to kill a living thing (even if only a stalk of celery) in order to eat it, but that would have been impossible as there was no death in prelapsarian garden.

So c’mon, connect the dots: if you ain’t eating or drinking, what exactly are you going to do by way of excreting?

Megalonyx, according to your blasphemous interpretation, Adam & Eve had no stomachs, no intestines, and no … ah, exit therefrom. Until they ate the forbidden fruit. Perhaps so, but what was within their torsos?

The Noah movie (the one with Russell Crowe) solved the problem by putting all the animals into suspended animation with magic incense. Thus, no eating or excreting. In all my years growing up in the fundie world, I never heard this particular solution. I’m surprised more haven’t latched onto it.

“Noah’s descendant, the Greek mathematician Archimedes of Syracuse”
It’s obvious that the great Archimedes received his information from an oral family tradition. And if Archimedes learned from Noah, no matter how indirectly, about how to make things float he must also have learned from him about the screw.

Believe it or not, some Young Earth Creationists claim that the Laws of Thermodynamics did not apply until after the fall. So some YECs insist that there was no excrement produced for that reason. (Of course it makes no sense!) But other YECs accept the existence of bodily waste before the fall–but claim that it didn’t stink!

I asked such a Young Earth Creationist if the non-stinky excrement smelled like roses. He replied, “This conversation is over if you insist on being silly.”

MegalonyxErik John Bertel’s pettifogging objection is easily dismissed:
As the YEC’ers have convincingly demonstrated that the speed of light was far slower in Biblical Times; it is equally likely that manure on the Noachic Ark was of far, far lower viscosity than the excrement of our own benighted times.

Well, my response to you is were you there? And if there is to be one constant in the universe it has to be the consistency of crap!